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The Meguiar’s Show and Shine at WTAC 2011 is shaping up to be the event of the year for import enthusiasts. Judging starts from 9 am with 35 trophies up for grabs. Amongst many others you will see in the flesh Mark Tarabay’s insane SUBLIME 200sx, Danny Makdesi’s CUSTM1 WRX, Natalie’s Coghlan MISSR Impreza and Kevin Smith’s BALLR Audi. These will line up against tuning heavyweights Croydon Racing who will be displaying their freshly rebuilt GTR700, Micks Motorsport's insane wide body S15 streetcar, and more.

Only a handful of brands can boast a legacy equal in stature to that of Nissan’s Z-car marque. The original Z sold way back in 1969 and it’s successors have been turning heads across the globe ever since. Fast forward more than forty years and we have this – the COR x Built To Order 370Z that’s breaking necks right here on the streets of Sydney. wned by local enthusiast, Peter, this 370 was first purchased in late 2010. It didn’t stay standard for long with Peter enlisting the help of new Sydney workshop, Built To Order, to get it sorted out.

What more can be said about the Nissan GT-R that hasn’t already been said somewhere on the internet? It is the most famous automotive marque in Japanese automotive history. Each generation of GT-R has served as an entry point into the world of turbocharged performance cars for many young petrol-heads over the decades. There is something about the faces of these cars that makes them instantly recognisable – the attraction is instinctive. You don’t have to be a studied enthusiast to know that the GT-R is special.

It’s been a while since we’ve covered an event like this on T-LD, so last Sunday we went out to V&E Rigoli for their annual dyno day. For those who aren’t familiar with what that means, it’s an open to the public event where drivers can bring their cars along to the workshop, run them on a rolling road and get a power readout for their setups. With a total of 80 cars on the dyno throughout the day, there was plenty of action for everyone, not to mention a blanket of blue skies, Sunday BBQ, music and high-power builds to admire.

OFFICIAL Fast & Furious Five: Drive-Ins Event Photos --- A HUGE thank you from Sydneys Biggest Car Cruises to all those that came out for the Fast Five event tonight. It was a MASSIVE turnout with over 1000 cars showing up for the event. Everyone was well behaved and the night ran very smoothly. Congrats to the trophy winners, also a HUGE thanks goes out to the sponsors of the event: Freestyle Magazine, Meguairs, HOK, LiquiMoly, Hot4s, Fast Fours, Fusion, iMODIFY, MotiveDVD, without their support, this night wouldnt have been as big as what it was.

THE-LOWDOWN.COM - It’s not too often in our local scene that a car like this appears totally unannounced. Most of the time when there’s a build under-way with parts as rare and exotic as these and a colour scheme as attention-grabbing as this one, people notice. But Chad, the owner of this sublime RX-7, managed to keep a tight lid on his project right up until it’s unveiling at Sydney’s Auto Salon late last year. We caught up with Chad in his hometown of Canberra to bring you this exclusive of the Mazda before it moves on. Chad has been a fan of Japanese motorsport for years. After watching a lot of SuperGT racing and D1 competitions, he knew he had to buy an FD RX-7 – and in 2007 he did. “Before I bought it, I knew exactly what I wanted to do,” he says. “The plan was always simple, but out there at the same time.”

This time around, Universal isn't even waiting to see how successful FAST FIVE is at the box office before stomping the accelerator on another sequel. Whether you love the Fast and the Furious franchise or hate it, you do have to respect it. After all, there aren't many movie franchises these days that make it past the third film, and even fewer that are successful enough to see all of their sequels released theatrically. This year’s Fast Five is - hang on, let me check - the fifth film in the successful action series, and Universal's already banking on it being profitable enough to warrant development on The Fast and the Furious 6, which we expect will be called either Furiously Fast, or Fast Six.

THE-LOWDOWN.COM "Nissan’s famous Midnight Purple could well be the most iconic factory colour to ever come out of Japan. Looking at these photos, it’s not hard to see why. Sydneysider, Derek, is the proud owner of this super clean, and tastefully modified, R34 GT-R. We took some time recently to capture it’s immaculate paintwork.
Derek bought his GT-R back in 2008. It’s safe to say that this is one of the most immaculate R34s in Australia. The car’s previous owner brought it to our shores as a personal import after owning it for five years in Japan. As an enthusiast, he had kept it in completely original condition. Before picking it up, Derek had been getting about in an EVO 8 MR, but he wanted something universally recognisable. This Skyline was the obvious choice." Read more

The Eastern Creek event, which pits highly modified production-based vehicles against each other in a series of hotlap sessions, was dominated by the Japanese CyberEVO team last year.
Creswick’s Hankook-backed WRX boasts approximately 700bhp at the wheels from its 2.5 litre turbocharged engine, as well as a full carbon fibre body.
Having lapped Goulburn’s Wakefield Park circuit within three seconds of the V8 Supercars lap record in testing, Creswick says he must match CyberEvo’s 2010 benchmark (1:30.587s) at Eastern Creek before this year’s event. Read more